#I'm going to listen to shitload of polish music now

[sibyl-of-space]

oOOOOooohhhhhhhh i get it now. i have Identified the Problem that has caused the most recent amadeus-related crisis/spiral/whatever you want to call it.

there are 5-ish "roles" that i have taken on as a solo dev:

project manager

musician/sound director

programmer/implementation engineer

writer/narrative lead

artist/art director

and for each i THOUGHT i had figured out how to tackle them.

project management: I've had some experience managing collaborative projects (GBA collab album, mystery jam game), I also solicited advice from other indie devs I met at Seattle Indies Expo, and I *also* applied what I learned about how we manage projects in facilities at my day job using Asana and have applied that to Amadeus. I very consciously treated this as a skill to learn and taking that specific skill seriously has helped a lot.

music: ...I straight up went to grad school for this. I took like a billion units every semester so I could learn as much as possible about composition AND mixing/production. This is the one thing I actually have a strong background in. I have the skillset and I also have People I can ask for feedback and advice. The music is lowkey going to carry this whole project.

programming: I went into this knowing full well I have exactly One semester of Unity/C# under my belt and have no idea what I am doing. I have experience learning basic HTML and JavaScript and have reverse engineered most of Ghost Trick's code via ROMhacking, so I have a sort of janky skillset, but it's very amateur and I knew that. I have asked SO many questions to people who are more experienced. KNOWING that this is my weakest suit has let me ask for help when I need it, and also accept that even the most polished possible form of this game is still going to be jank as fuck. That's fine. My #vision will still come through.

writing: the whole reason I set aside an entire month to just focus on the Mystery Jam game was because I knew I needed more experience writing, and specifically writing mystery. I've spoiled the whole game to two different people who have writing experience in order to bounce ideas and get feedback. I've asked for workflow advice from a third person with writing experience. Identifying this as a weakness has helped me focus on improving it, and because of that I am really happy with where it's at right now.

Which leads us to....

...art.

My problem with art is that as of about 2 years ago, I was much more confident in my art than I was in basically anything else except music, because I have drawn stuff my whole life and have a shitload of informal practice at it. So I focused very heavily on the other stuff that was very obviously a weakness.

But, as we approach the final months of Go Time to finish the first episode... I'm like, hm, it turns out that the art and art direction of a visual novel are kind of important.

I *like* all of the assets I've drawn for the currently existing demo, but there are specific things about the overall look I don't quite like, and there is a specific metanarrative Thing that I have been trying to evoke with what I'm doing visually and I feel like sticking to that is at odds with making assets that look and "feel" right.

Basically I haven't really thought as much about art direction as I should have since finishing the demo because I kinda figured I could coast on the fact I consider myself a pretty good artist. I can make things that look Nice. But now that I've worked hard at my other areas of weaknesses, the fact I haven't really sat down with my art direction in the past 4-5 months is really starting to become obvious.

All this to say.

My "assignment" for this afternoon is to sit outside listening to all the tracks I've written (including new WIP ones no one but me has heard yet CUZ THEYRE AWESOME im SO excited about the new tracks im writing for this) and reading through my revised narrative with certain finalized plot points and concepts, and just sketching out visually what the game Should Look Like. I am almost certain I can still use the assets I've already drawn, like the sprites and backgrounds and icons and such, but I may edit them differently, or add to them, or otherwise change something about them. I just need to make some choices because I'm feeling stuck and I need to get un-stuck if I am going to finish this game AND I AM DETERMINED TO DO SO.

[the-aesthetic-weasel]

2, 9, 12,18, 29!

Hi, thanks for the ask!

2.  do you prefer spending your holidays in your country or travel abroad?

A combination of both. I’m from Europe, so everything is tiny and close to each other. Each year I usually go on one bigger holiday abroad. It’s also quite cheap cause I travel by hitch-hiking a lot. And I also travel a lot on the weekends and shorter holidays, I go hiking in the woods and mountains a lot, visit castles and other towns and that’s usually just within the Czech Republic. 

9. which of your neighbouring countries would you like to visit most/know best?

I apologise to the other three of our amazing and endlessly interesting neighbours, even my dear, dear Slovakia, but I have to pick Poland. I was there last summer and it was one of the best holidays I’ve ever had. I love so much about the country, the folklore, people, the food. Gdańsk is the most beautiful city I’ve ever seen (followed closely by Toruń). The night I spent by the Baltic coast on Hel was one of the best ones of my entire life. I am such a massive fangirl of Poland. Oh and their folk costumes are to die for. And their language is both incredibly hot and incredibly hilarious.

12. what do you think about English translations of your favourite native prose/poem?

To be honest, I’ve never read any properly. I make a point of trying to read everything I’m able to in the original language. But some that you can find online and aren’t bad are poems from Ivan Blatný, Václav Hrabě, František Gellner, J. H. Krchovský and Jan Skácel (The Song of Proximate Blame). And of course Franz Kafka but he doesn’t count as his works were originally written in German.

18. do you speak with a dialect of your native language?

Yes I do, sort of. My family comes from Southern Moravia, which can be easily identified by other Czech natives because of specific pronounciation and some words. Also my mum was raised in Brno, which is a big city that has it’s own slang, sort of comparable to London cockney, and she uses it a lot and so do I.(When the musical My Fair Lady was translated to Czech, Eliza spoke this way). 

So my speech is sort of a mix between rural South-Moravian dialects and this Brno thing which is called Hantec. It’s not that rare though, a lot of people come from similar backgrounds here in Brno, but I’ve been told my accent is pretty strong and I use a lot of the region-specific words. I confuse people from the western part of the country on regular basis.

29. does your region/city have a beef with another place in your country?

Oh yes, yes we do. Brno is the second largest city in the country, so naturally there’s a lot of competition with Prague. You know how this sort of rivalry goes though, there’s no actual hostility, it’s just fun. But Prague is the butt of the joke in most regions as it’s also the capital, and I think it’s more or less the same in most places. The typical japes about Prague include: they’re all perfumed wusses, they have ridiculous accents, their beer is shit, they can’t drink, they don’t know what snow looks like, they know nothing about wine. Of course all of these are just stupid, envious jokes and not actually true (apart from the beer one, come fight me)